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“PROBLEMS IN THE CLINTON ADMINISTRATION” mentioning the U.S. Dept. of Energy was published in the House of Representatives section on pages H15257-H15258 on Dec. 20, 1995.
The publication is reproduced in full below:
PROBLEMS IN THE CLINTON ADMINISTRATION
The SPEAKER pro tempore. Under a previous order of the House, the gentleman from Kansas [Mr. Tiahrt] is recognized for 5 minutes.
Mr. TIAHRT. Mr. Speaker, we have heard a lot of nonsense about the Republicans ruining Christmas for some of the Government workers. I want to talk a little bit about the Fourth District of Kansas. We have 1,038 Federal workers subject to furlough. This week the President vetoed legislation that would have put 940 of them back to work, 940, but the President vetoed Christmas for those employees and their families. Thank you very much, Mr. President.
You know, there is struggle going on here about balancing the budget, and we have come to a real critical point, because if we are unable to balance the budget now, then when will we balance it? We have a future to think about for our children. We are $5 trillion in debt. It is a tremendous amount of money. We are trying to strengthen our economy.
We have seen two dramatic moves in our economy. No. 1, when we went through the 5,000 mark on the New York Stock Exchange, it was the same week when we thought we had an agreement to balance the Federal budget in 7 years. This week, when we thought the balanced budget had failed, the stock market dropped dramatically, over 100 points, and then bounced back the next day, when Alan Greenspan, Chairman of the Federal Reserve, said that he hoped that we could get to a balanced budget, and in good faith he was going to lower interest rates a quarter of a percent.
But it is going to be very difficult for the President to concede to a balanced budget, because his liberal agenda does not include balancing the budget, only paying off liberal interest groups. Plus he is being dragged down by members of his own Cabinet.
Currently Secretary O'Leary in the Department of Energy is falling under fire. It started out with GAO reports as early as the first part of this year when they reported that she had a ``mission a minute,'' quote-unquote, a mission a minute, that there were very large management problems within the Department. Then Vice President Gore's National Performance Review came out, which said that portions of the Department of Energy, like of the environmental management portion, was 40-percent inefficient, and it could cost taxpayers $70 billion over the next 30 years.
Then we started to see travel problems, with the Secretary of the Department of Energy having the highest travel budget per trip of anyone inside the President's Cabinet, staying at four-star hotels, traveling first class, taking along large staffs for her domestic travel. But that was all based on her current responsibilities in the Department of Energy, which are all domestic.
Then we started to hear about the international trips. Secretary O'Leary has taken 16 international trips, taking along as many as 50 staff members, as many as 68 guests, often CEO's who do not pay their portion of the travels. One trip cost $720,000. With 16 of them, it is in the millions of dollars, the costs of this. Often she travels on the same plane as Madonna leases. So the material girl of Clinton's Cabinet is spending unwisely taxpayer dollars in these travels.
She hires photographers and video crews to come along, because she wants to be caught at her best. She is very worried about the public image she is presenting and has been quoted as trying to bring the second term of the President's campaign, the ideals of it, to the forefront now.
In the zeal to project a good public image, Secretary O'Leary has hired a personal media consultant at a cost of $75,000 per year to the taxpayers. She also employs inside the Department of Energy more than 520 public relations employees at a payroll of over $25 million per year. She has even hired a private investigative firm to investigate reporters and Congressmen who are tarnishing her favorable image. She has developed a list of unfavorables.
Well, it is going to be hard to hit the budget target, especially when you are unable to control spending like this. This is excessive, it is unnecessary, and it is a waste. We are so concerned about the poor, and yet we allow first-class travel within members of the Cabinet overseas, on the same airplane that is leased by Madonna. That is not the lifestyle that is projected by the administration when they are trying to speak for the poor. It is quite the opposite.
So, Mr. Speaker, I would encourage President Clinton to ask for the resignation of Secretary O'Leary. I would urge him to get back into some honest negotiations on the Federal budget, so that we can enjoy Christmas as a government, get everyone back to work, and also preserve a future for our children, strengthen our economy, and just plain do the right thing. Balancing the budget is the right thing to do.
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